Ultimately, though, it’s safe to assume that prices on furniture and decor will continue to rise. “I don’t anticipate that furniture is going to get less expensive at any point in the near future, or over the next two or three years,” says Shannon Williams, CEO of the Home Furnishings Association (HFA), North America’s largest organization devoted to the needs and interests of home furnishings retailers.
That’s why Kannan suggests buying the following products sooner rather than later:
- Any upholstered products (e.g. sofas and recliners)
- Any wood products (e.g. dining sets, chairs and outdoor furniture)
- Anything from IKEA
- Light fixtures and LED lamps
- Decorative items
- Foam mattresses
Similarly, if you’re planning on updating your kitchen cabinets, Kannan recommends putting a deposit on the supplies as soon as possible.
How to avoid paying more for furniture and decor because of the tariffs
In addition to shopping sooner rather than later, here are a few other ways you can avoid the tariffs, once they kick in:
Furniture and decor that’s manufactured in the United States using primarily American-made materials—like Appalachian wood—should not be as affected by the tariffs.
Furniture made in the US tends to be high-quality and traditionally has been pricier than imported furniture. Once the tariffs take effect, products from American manufacturers that use domestic materials may be the more affordable option.
If or when the administration’s tariffs take effect, they’ll primarily impact items imported into the US A simple way to avoid the highest tariffs is to check the label or tag on a product to see where it was manufactured.
But it’s not simply a matter of looking for “Made in the USA” labels: because the proposed tariffs differ from country-to-country, you can determine how much the price of a product would be impacted by tariffs based on where it was manufactured. For example, you might want to avoid pieces made in China—which currently has a 145% tariff—and seek out items made in the European Union, which previously had a proposed tariff of 20%.
Look for furniture available the same day (or the next day)
Perhaps even more important than where a piece was made is whether a retailer has it in stock. “Most people’s warehouses are pretty full, because demand in general is really light,” Williams says. “When the inventory is depleted and manufacturers will have to go back and buy the materials and buy the pieces of furniture from Asia, that’s when we’ll see the impact of the tariffs.” For this reason, she recommends looking for furniture that’s available the same day or the next day, as the retailer is less likely to have raised their prices.
According to Williams, furniture is sold three ways: directly to the consumer, through an intermediary retailer like Walmart, Wayfair, Amazon, or Costco, and finally, in locally owned or regional brand furniture stores.
“Traditional brick-and-mortar [furniture stores] are going to give a consumer the best value right now, because they’re not turning inventory at the same rate that the [online and intermediary retailers] are, and they actually own their inventory, which means they’re going to have the longest lifetime until tariffs are applied,” she explains. “While these family-owned businesses have had less market share over the last 25 years, they’re the ones that have the best ability to service and support.”
Manufacturers that sell imported furniture directly to consumers and intermediary retailers—which get much of their inventory from overseas—will likely be affected by tariffs first, Williams adds.
Antique, vintage, or secondhand items purchased in the US won’t be impacted by tariffs, says Virginia Chamlee, author of Big Thrift Energy. This means hitting up antique malls, vintage shops, secondhand retailers, and thrift stores. “There is a bit more of a hunt involved, but thrift stores in particular are subject to no tariffs and full of affordable—and often valuable—pieces of furniture, plus art and accessories,” she says. For those on a tight budget, Kannan recommends scouring eBay, Craigslist, and local area Listservs where people sell their used furniture.